2017-18 Donruss Optic Basketball Cards

Although many of the designs come from the main Donruss NBA set, 2017-18 Donruss Optic Basketball uses that captivating shine to set itself apart. Each hobby box averages one autograph.

Of course, Optic NBA is also known for the many colorful Prizm parallels and these combine with inserts to come one per pack.

2017-18 Donruss Optic Basketball Base / Inserts

Joining the base set and Rated Rookie subset in the 2017-18 Donruss Optic Basketball checklist are many parallels, such as Gold Vinyl (1/1) and the debut for Velocity Pink and Velocity Black.

Featuring looks first seen in 2017-18 Donruss, the Optic inserts include All Clear for Takeoff, All-Stars, Retro Series, Swishful Thinking, The Champ is Here, and The Rookies. These also have a full assortment of parallels.

There are also quite a few 2017-18 Donruss Optic Basketball retail exclusives as far as Prizm parallels only found in Blaster, Hanger and the main Retail boxes.

Trey Treutel | E-Mail Author
Trey Treutel is an Ole Miss grad and a lifelong sports fanatic. He is a huge fan of the NBA and NFL, as well as soccer, college basketball and college football. As a kid, he collected football and basketball cards. In more recent years, he started collecting basketball cards again on a whim and has since expanded to other sports and entertainment options. Find Trey on Twitter at @datreute or Google+.

User Reviews

I guess panini can now put fast break in front of a set and sell double of the same set now? Only difference I can see here 10 cards less in fast break then no fast break…. Also that one big/money name auto will be in the fast break case. So does that mean the non fast break case will have no big/money name autos or more than one per case??? ;)
Its hilarious what this card company does.

I agree with the other review though the Fast Break does give you more cards per case, not per box. Per case the Fast Break will give you 1,800 cards and 20 autos (1 will be of the better players for sure). The Hobby case will produce 960 cards and 12 autos (no top players guaranteed – probably because they fall one per 20 boxes).

Panini doesn’t seem to care about core customers and just placates to the big distributors to gouge the little guy. I spent 4 hours trying to get a box of ‘first of the line’ on their website and their servers kept crashing and I couldn’t check out. Now, I’m seeing all these breakers with full cases and high prices on these cards.

The cards seem average. All they do is put the current Donruss set in a chrome version, which just seems kind of lazy to eek out a few more dollars to sell boxes and overproduct and crash the sports card market again.

Optic is a top notch product, kinda like Topps Chrome, which I both love..The set has “Rated Rookies” come on!! All Rated Rookies Rock!! Plus, I picked it up for about the price of 3 Blaster Boxes!! With Free Shipping!!!

On the surface it looks like this would be a great product…but…like others have said – Panini is the master of making the smallest changes and calling it something “new” so they can sell double and triple of the same thing. Overproducing all their cards and drastically reducing secondary market.

I bought 1 of each of their retail packages – hanger 3 pack, regular blaster, and mega blaster. I had cards from each that had production damage on the back side of the cards – roller marks, crimping on the edge, unclean cuts on the borders, etc. That is very disappointing.

Hit all sort of nice stuff in the case I preordered for $1080. Kobe Bryant auto, Donovan Mitchell auto, Karl Malone auto, 2 Mitchell Holos, gold vinyl 1/1 of a base card, 2 gold rated rookie autos.
Overall though, this is a pretty solid product, especially because the rated rookie autos are on-card.
Retail is never anywhere close to as good as hobby, this is a fact of life. I saw minimal quality control issues compared to panini prizm, which is in far higher demand.
If you got the preorder price, value is great without question. If you’re going to pay $150-200 a box, it will be a disappointment.

bought 3 blaster boxes, no autos or serial numbered cards, 5 purple parallels, 2 refractors of nobody, and 10 inserts. One of the packs was missing one card and had only 3 base cards in it. The cards are warped pretty bad, needs a thicker paper base under the laminate front. I give it average because this is average of panini.

I echo everyone’s thoughts about Fast Break, but as that’s been done with Prizm as well, I don’t really want to knock Optic specifically for the ugly cash grab that it is.

When it comes to the standard Optic set, I can’t sing its praises enough. It’s a huge step up from the Donruss release that really is comparable to Topps Chrome. The on-card Rated Rookie autos are fantastic, and the parallels are sharp. I’m definitely a fan – other than my year-to-year love of Revolution – this is probably my favorite release of 17-18.

Featured Sites

Sign Up For The Cardboard Connection Insider

Stay Up to Date on the Latest Sports Cards, Memorabilia, Fan Apparel and Entertainment Collectibles Product Information, Checklists, Articles and Coverage, as well as Newsletter Exclusive Content and Contests.

Rest assured we have the utmost respect for your privacy and will NEVER share your contact information with anyone under any circumstances.